Locals Come Together For Annual San Bernardino Christmas Parade
LOS ANGELES (CBSLA.com) — Crowds gathered in downtown San Bernardino on Saturday trying to start healing as a community at the annual Christmas parade, but fear of more attacks were still at the forefront of the conversation.
"My daughter still has nightmares because it was so close," San Bernardino resident Marie Perales said.
"We live pretty close, and she's scared, they don't want nothing to happen like that, she keeps asking me if there are more people like that," Perales added.
Ruben Hernandez watched in fear as his home became front and center of the shoot out between police, Syed Farook and Tashfeen Malik.
Hernandez's son was inside the family home, with his dad on the phone with him watching on television, terrified for his son's safety.
"The house was being shot at and I told him to get as far back away to the back of the house and to get low," Hernandez said.
"He was able to hear the shots hitting things out in front, and then to find out how many shots were fired at the SUV, that was just, you know, obviously nerve-racking, just whizzing across your home," he added.
Hernandez's home is now riddled with bullet holes -- a lasting reminder of the carnage that occured on the street just days before.
For others like Augustine Medina's 87-year old grandmother, the damage is emotional.
She was all alone, and forced to get down on the ground and take cover, paralyzed with fear, thinking the killers were on another rampage.
"When the shoot out began and she heard the thunder of automatic weapons, her windows, curtains, and light posts started rattling and she thought the shooters were coming into this neighborhood to claim more victims," Augustine Medina told CBS2's Adrianna Weingold.
While law enforcement has assured the public that there aren't any credible threats right now, many people we spoke with who have lived in this neighborhood for decades say it's going to take awhile before they feel safe again.
